Written Answers Friday 17 December 2010

Scottish Executive

Agriculture

Murdo Fraser (Mid Scotland and Fife) (Con): To ask the Scottish Executive what schemes it has piloted for agencies to work together to ensure that they carry out inspections of farms in single visits.

Richard Lochhead: Since launching in June 2008, Scotland’s Environmental and Rural Services (SEARS) - a partnership of eight delivery-focused bodies within the Environment and Rural Affairs portfolio - has looked for opportunities to combine inspections where appropriate.

  By end March 2010, SEARS reduced the number of service-generated, separate inspections and visits to rural land managers by 4,996. SEARS is on target to deliver a further reduction of around 3,000 by end March 2011.

  Details of the schemes involved are described in the SEARS Annual Reviews 2008-09 and 2009-10.

  http://www.sears.scotland.gov.uk/pdf/SEARS_Annual_Review_2008-09.pdf.

  http://www.sears.scotland.gov.uk/Default.aspx.

British Irish Council

Jamie Hepburn (Central Scotland) (SNP): To ask the Scottish Executive whether it will report on the outcome of the British Irish Council Summit.

Fiona Hyslop: On 13 December 2010, the 15th meeting of the British Irish Council was held on the Isle of Man. We had a successful meeting attended by ministers from all eight member administrations. The Minister for Parliamentary Business and I represented the Scottish Government.

  The meeting began with a discussion on current economic developments and the measures being taken by each administration to tackle these issues. The Scottish Government noted the adverse impact on capital investment programmes of the recent UK Government’s spending review. The council agreed that these serious economic challenges reinforce the value of sharing information and knowledge amongst members, as the respective administrations work towards economic recovery.

  The council then welcomed a paper on digital inclusion with all council members recognising the increasing importance of digital inclusion to equality of opportunity and for the delivery of more efficient public services. As with previous summits, the meeting received progress reports and agreed a plan for future work on the subjects currently being taken forward by council members. These are drugs misuse; demography; digital inclusion; the environment; energy, both grid infrastructure and marine renewables; collaborative spatial planning; early years; indigenous, minority and lesser-used languages; transport, and social inclusion

  The council considered a number of operational issues regarding the establishment of the Standing Secretariat in Edinburgh, and agreed the Scottish Government’s proposals on cost sharing and a draft running cost budget. I also gave the council the Scottish Government’s commitment to bring forward details of the proposed accommodation for the Standing Secretariat once the opening date has been agreed by the council.

  I am placing a copy of the Communiqué that was issued by the British Irish Council after the meeting in the Scottish Parliament Information Centre (Bib. number 52223).

Dentistry

Murdo Fraser (Mid Scotland and Fife) (Con): To ask the Scottish Executive what percentage of (a) children and (b) adults in Tayside has access to an NHS dentist.

Shona Robison: At 30 September 2010, 79.8% of children and 66.6% of adults living in Tayside were registered with an NHS dentist.

Digital Technology

Christine Grahame (South of Scotland) (SNP): To ask the Scottish Executive when the announcement will be made of the awards to LEADER local action groups under the Broadband Challenge Fund.

Richard Lochhead: I am pleased to announce today that five LEADER Local Action groups will receive awards under the Broadband Challenge Fund announced on 1 July 2010.

  I refer the member to the answer to question S3W-34982 on 1 July 2010. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament’s website, the search facility for which can be found at http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/Apps2/Business/PQA/Default.aspx.

  These are Borders, Forth Valley and Lomond, Outer Hebrides, Orkney and South Lanarkshire.

  Thirteen local action groups bid for the funding. Unfortunately, this far outstripped the resources of €1 million available. The assessment panel comprised of the government and external experts in rural community development and IT judged the winning bids as providing the maximum value for money in terms of advancing our rural development objectives and deploying relevant broadband provision. The estimate is that around 88 businesses will be supported from these bids. In Lomond Valley alone, the estimate is that 100 new jobs will be created.

  Nevertheless, I commend all the local action groups which applied. This was a tough decision. I hope that local action groups who did not succeed will be able to take some of the local projects forward using existing allocations as part of achieving its local development strategy.

Environment

Murdo Fraser (Mid Scotland and Fife) (Con): To ask the Scottish Executive what it has done to promote farmers’ markets in order to reduce food miles.

Richard Lochhead: The Scottish Government is committed to supporting the growth of farmers markets in Scotland. We have funded the Scottish Farmers Market Partnership with around £200,000 over three years to help them support farmers markets throughout Scotland. Since the project began in January 2010, the partnership has provided advice and support to over 100 individuals and around 50 farmers markets. The partnership has also dealt with over 1,500 enquiries from consumers and prospective farmers’ market stall holders at information stands organised at the Royal Highland Show and the BBC Good Food Show Scotland.

Flood Prevention

Sarah Boyack (Edinburgh Central) (Lab): To ask the Scottish Executive whether it will consider using any underspend from the 2010-11 rural affairs and environment budget to prioritise work on the Water of Leith Flood Prevention Scheme.

John Swinney: Funding for flooding projects, including that allocated to the City of Edinburgh Council, has been rolled up in the local government finance settlement since 2008-09. As such, it is a matter for individual councils to decide how they allocate the total funding at its disposal to meet its own local needs and priorities, including those for flooding schemes.

  For its part, the Scottish Government has agreed with COSLA that in allocating the available capital grant it provides amongst councils, it has also maintained funding for specific elements within the total. The Scottish Government has therefore protected the funding allocations for flood prevention schemes, including the Water of Leith Scheme that was approved earlier.

Health

Mary Scanlon (Highlands and Islands) (Con): To ask the Scottish Executive how health inequalities are (a) measured and (b) monitored and what progress has been made in reducing such inequalities since 2007.

Shona Robison: Equally Well,  the report of the Ministerial Task Force on Health Inequalities, set out arrangements for the long-term monitoring of health inequalities. The headline indicators of inequalities in health outcomes, recommended to the task force by a technical advisory group are:

  Healthy Life Expectancy (at birth)

  Premature Mortality - from all causes, aged under 75 years

  Mental Wellbeing - adults aged 16 years and over

  Low birth weight.

  These are supported by indicators for:

  Coronary Heart Disease (first ever hospital admission for heart attack aged under 75 years; deaths aged 45 to 74 years)

  Cancer (incidence rate aged under 75 years; deaths aged 45 to 74 years)

  Alcohol (first ever hospital admission aged under 75 years; deaths aged 45 to 74 years)

  All-cause mortality aged 15 to 44 years (to capture large inequalities in mortality observed in this age group)

  Data against these indicators are collected and published annually by the Scottish Government.

  The third report was published in October 2010:

  http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2010/10/25144246/0.

  In terms of progress made since 2007 there is no simple answer. For some indicators, inequalities have reduced and for some they have increased. For others they have remained stable. Given the long-term nature of the health inequalities challenge, we would not expect significant changes in the indicators over the short-time period since 2007.

  In addition, the National Performance Framework includes targets to increase healthy life expectancy at birth in the most deprived areas and to reduce mortality from coronary heart disease among the under 75s in deprived areas. Progress against these measures is reported through Scotland Performs http://www.scotland.gov.uk/About/scotPerforms.

  The Ministerial Task Force reconvened earlier this year to review progress since the publication of Equally Well. The report of the review was published in June and included a recommendation to convene again in 2012 to review progress:

  http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2010/06/22170625/0.

Health

Mary Scanlon (Highlands and Islands) (Con): To ask the Scottish Executive for what reason the weekly consumption of alcohol and the average millilitres of alcohol per person per week are both higher in England than in Scotland yet alcohol-related deaths for males are more than twice as high in Scotland and for females almost twice as high according to Centre for Public Policy for Regions health spending statistics.

Shona Robison: The World Health Organization advises that the volume of alcohol use in a country is best estimated from national sales, production and/or taxation data since population surveys invariably underestimate total alcohol consumption. Moreover, Scottish data from the General Lifestyle Survey (GLF) 2008 - the population survey used by the Centre for Public Policy for the Regions - should be treated with significant caution given the small sample size.

  The Scottish Health Survey (SHeS), with a Scottish sample size around four times that of the GLF, is therefore the preferred population survey measure of alcohol consumption in Scotland. The SHeS: UK Comparisons report, published in August 2010, compared SHeS Scottish estimates with Health Survey for England (HSE) figures. It showed that a significantly higher proportion of men and women in Scotland exceeded the sensible daily drinking guidelines and a significantly higher proportion drank twice the recommended limit (a measure of "binge" drinking) on at least one occasion in the previous week. Mean daily consumption on the heaviest drinking day was also considerably higher for both men and women in Scotland. Millilitres of alcohol purchased is not a robust measure of relative consumption levels across countries, as it takes no account of the strength of the alcohol purchased.

  In addition, sales data published by NHS Health Scotland in July 2010 showed that per capital alcohol sales were 24% higher in Scotland in 2009 than in England and Wales. Average weekly sales per adult (aged 16 and over) in Scotland equated to 22.9 units, 4.5 units higher than in England and Wales (18.4 units). Higher alcohol sales in Scotland have been evident throughout the period covered by this data, i.e. since 2005.

  The higher per capita weekly alcohol sales in Scotland are likely to, at least in part, explain the higher alcohol-related mortality rates in Scotland. In addition, SHeS data suggests people in Scotland are more likely to exceed sensible daily limits and to binge drink than their English counterparts, increasing their risk of developing acute and chronic alcohol-related health conditions.

Mental Health

Mary Scanlon (Highlands and Islands) (Con): To ask the Scottish Executive what is being done to address the high death rate caused by mental and behavioural issues, which is treble the rate in England and double the rate in Wales and Northern Ireland according to UK health statistics.

Shona Robison: The Scottish Government is engaged with its partners in advancing an ambitious programme to further improve the mental health and wellbeing of the people of Scotland by ensuring good quality mental health services are available for everyone that needs them at all levels of need; promoting attitudes and behaviour in the general public which lead to mental well-being, and delivering modern, fit for purpose mental health legislation.

  Caution should be used in interpretation and comparison of the UK health statistics data given differences in collection methods used across the UK. Anticipated improvements in data collection from next year will provide more consistent figures and allow more accurate comparison across the UK.

  The data shows that in Scotland the vast majority of the deaths recorded as being caused by mental and behavioural issues are due to dementia (2,585 out of 3,327). There is no suggestion that more people die from dementia in Scotland than in other parts of the UK and the improvements in data collection will allow more accurate comparison in future. We are committed to improving the quality of life of those with dementia, their families and carers through delivery of our National Dementia Strategy published earlier this year.

Mental Health

Mary Scanlon (Highlands and Islands) (Con): To ask the Scottish Executive how it will ensure that the reduction in psychiatric admissions is being achieved in accordance with best quality care and treatment standards.

Shona Robison: NHS boards continue to make every effort to ensure any admission to hospital is clinically appropriate and in the best interests of the patient. Care and treatment for all those with a mental health problem is delivered in accordance with national clinical guidelines and other relevant standards with appropriate governance and monitoring processes in place.

Rural Development

Murdo Fraser (Mid Scotland and Fife) (Con): To ask the Scottish Executive what initiatives it has brought in to reduce regulation on the farming community.

Richard Lochhead: I refer the member to the answer to question S3O-11876 on 11 November 2010. All answers to oral/written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament’s website, the search facility for which can be found at:

  http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/Apps2/Business/PQA/Default.aspx.

Scottish Government Expenditure

Sarah Boyack (Edinburgh Central) (Lab): To ask the Scottish Executive whether there is a projected underspend in the 2010-11 rural affairs and environment budget.

John Swinney: All Scottish Government expenditure is being closely monitored and managed so that there will be a very small underspend by the end of the financial year, in line with recent performance. HM Treasury has advised that it has abolished the existing end year flexibility arrangements which means that we will not be allowed to carry forward any underspend from 2010-11 to a future financial year.

  The very small underspend anticipated will be after our budget for 2010-11 has been reduced for the sum we are planning to carry forward to 2011-12 to support the capital programme in that year.

Scottish Government Legislation

Murdo Fraser (Mid Scotland and Fife) (Con): To ask the Scottish Executive how many times it has replaced regulations with new versions rather than add to existing regulations since May 2007.

Richard Lochhead: Most of the regulation impacting on Scotland’s farmers and land managers comes from Europe and to ensure they fully meet its obligations under the terms of the Scotland Act, Scottish ministers must implement relevant EU rules. Since 2007, a total of 105 SSI’s have been made in the broad area of agriculture replacing or revoking 63 previous SSI’s.

Smoking

Dr Richard Simpson (Mid Scotland and Fife) (Lab): To ask the Scottish Executive, further to the answer to question S3W-37464 by Shona Robison on 22 November 2010, what the budget in real terms for smoking cessation-related activity was in (a) 2009-10 and (b) 2010-11 and will be for 2011-12.

Shona Robison: Using 2009-10 figure of £13,128,096 as the baseline figure the actual 2010-11 figure of £13,013,096 in real terms is £12,621,820.

  However, the 2009-10 figure contains short-term funding for NHS Tayside that came to an end during that period. Without this short-term funding the actual budget would have been £12,946,096 compared to the core budget for 2010-11 of £13,013,096.

  The exact budget for 2011-12 is still to be determined but as things stand we envisage that the specific funding made available will remain at 2010-11 levels.

  The above figures are in 2009-10 prices and are based on the GDP deflator http://www.hm-treasury.gov.uk/data_gdp_fig.htm.